welcome to miami

As most of you know I went to Miami about two weeks ago. It was a beautiful 60-73 degrees there! The scene flying in was gorgeous and the answer to Jeremy's first question when I got back was yes, did it look like it does on CSI Miami. We landed, found a taxi and we were off! Now I've never ridden in a taxi before but they truly do drive like they do in the movies...like a bat out of hades! Some of you know that I get car sick easily and I was SOOO thankful to be out of that car (and that I had taken some Dramamine!)

Here's the room I stayed in. I felt like a giddy little kid being able to jump from bed to bed and not get caught doing it! haha

The view was nothing to write home about. It over looked another roof which was kind of sad and not what I was expecting.


After putting down my bags I found this:

I honestly don't know what it is about my fascination with over priced bottled water. I guess I just think it's ridiculous. They charge $6.50 for their water unlike Atlanta who only charges $4.95. I yet again stuck with tap water. I got their early afternoon and since we didn't have time to stop and get anything to eat from the airport to the hotel I got to order room service. They had VERY good food there. Everything was done to perfection.
This is the back of the hotel where there is a river canal running through it. BEAUTIFUL!


We had our dinner reception on this patio on the canal the night before. love love loved all the palm trees!


The second night we were there we took a tram to bayside and walked to pier 5 for supper. Down there the have an outside shopping mall and restaurants on the ocean. We ate outside at the Hard Rock Cafe. I was awestruck by the handiwork of God on such a beautiful night and the massive waves of the ocean. I could sit and watch that for hours. so peaceful.

See the pineapple in the picture below?! It's a building called Club Cabana. It was a pretty cool looking building.

I was SOOOO glad to get home even though my flight in Chicago was delayed by 50 minutes and I got off the plane to a blizzardy snow storm in a jacket and summer shoes (i.e. no socks).

Going back to when we took the tram through downtown Miami to get to bayside it reminded me of a missions trip that YAC took to St. Louis when I was in high school. There were homeless people sleeping in the tunnels and under the stairs and escalators that took you down to ground level from the tram. Women were walking around by themselves in the midst of men yelling inappropriate and derogatory words as we walked past them. I didn't even feel safe walking in a group of three and wonder if some of those women made it safely to their destination.